On Islamist Terrorism, WSJ Entitled to Its Own Opinions–But Not Its Own Facts

A recent Wall Street Journal editorial (3/11/11) defended the Peter King hearings on Islamist terrorism against “our friends on the left [who] are busy portraying them as the McCarthy hearings and Palmer Raids rolled into one.”

The editors argued that in fact, the focus on Muslims is justified based on the facts:

Since 9/11, there have been more than 50 known cases, involving about 130 individuals, in which terrorist plots were hatched on American soil. These include plots to blow up the Brooklyn Bridge in New York, an office tower in Dallas, a federal court house in Illinois, the Washington, D.C. metro, and the trans-Alaska pipeline. Most of these schemes were foiled at an early stage, though the Times Square bomber failed only at the moment of ignition. The worst attack was Major Nidal Hasan’s November 2009 murder of 13 soldiers at Fort Hood.

In a useful report published by the Rand Corporation last year, terrorism expert Brian Michael Jenkins notes that the plotters were a “diverse group” that included Caucasians, African-Americans and Hispanics as well as immigrants (or their children) from about 20 countries. Yet all but two of the plotters were Muslim, and those two sought to offer their services to al Qaeda.

So much, then, for the notion that it is bigoted for Mr. King to focus on Muslim radicalization. This is where the current threat lies.

This is a complete misrepresentation of the Rand report. The report is exclusively about Muslim radicalization and jihadism, not about domestic terrorism in general, as the WSJ would lead you to believe–if anything, it’s surprising that there are any non-Muslim jihadist plotters. (The exceptions were two men who agreed for their own secular purposes to collaborate with undercover FBI informants purporting to work for Al-Qaeda.)

The vast majority of “homegrown” terrorist attackers–those of all ideologies who successfully carry out an attack–are not Muslim, the report finds: Of the “83 terrorist attacks in the United States between 9/11 and the end of 2009, only three…were clearly connected with the jihadist cause.” The other jihadist plots referred to by both the report and the WSJ were disrupted by authorities–quite often because those authorities themselves helped generate them.

One key point of the report, in fact, is to say that homegrown jihadism is not nearly as big a threat as it’s made out to be–exactly the opposite of the argument that the WSJ is trying to make.

“Americans are entitled to an assessment of how serious a threat this is,” wrote the WSJ editors. I agree: It’s about time they and the rest of the King hearing supporters (that includes you, Bill O’Reilly) stop unjustly demonizing American Muslims and present the facts.

Managing Editor of Extra! Magazine
Julie Hollar is the managing editor of FAIR's magazine, Extra!. Her work received an award from Project Censored in 2005, and she has been interviewed by such media outlets as the Los Angeles Times, Agence France-Presse and the San Francisco Chronicle. A graduate of Rice University, she has written for the Texas Observer and coordinated communications and activism at the Lesbian/Gay Rights Lobby of Texas. Hollar also co-directed the 2006 documentary Boy I Am and was previously active in the Paper Tiger Television collective.

there are no moderate or radical muslims there are only muslims and they have been raping robbing and killing infidels for 14 centuries.so don’t be surprised when muslims act like their pedophile prophet because he was the head murder, thief and raper of little girls. it was liberals who brought muslims and other third world bums into this country with ted kennedy’s immigration reform of 1965. the jews are finding out that there is no living with muslims we should pay attention and start expelling the more hostile muslims now and no more anti-american immigration reforms.

the hearings in congress was just another dog and pony show with out robert spencer and steve emerson.the worst was that racist muslim keith mohamadan and his crocodile tears that the minnesota idiots sent to congress.

The biggest threat to me is getting hit by a crazy person while driving to the grocery store … or crossing a U.S. street, in a crosswalk. Come on people, terrorists are far less of threat to your life and freedom than is your owned damned government.

You’re rollin’, Bruce, but you’re imbecile screed seems to have tuckered you out, or you overloaded, or something–the single word post above, correcting a grammatical mistake? You’re kidding, right? All your posts are rife with numbskull ideas and semi-literate ravings (what do you have against capital letters?), so the correction was utterly unnecessary. Work on using caps, dude! Then double-time it in the punctuation department! That’s how you should roll, elsewise folks will just think you’re a prejudiced, uninformed raver. And Keith Ellison is not a racist, you schmuck, but you certainly are.

HReading, you are soooo correct! You have a greater chance of being hit by lightning than killed in a terrorist attack. This country needs to step back, take a few deep breaths, and look at this subject rationally. Not that I’m holding my breath waiting for that to happen….

Well stats aside that seem to prove we have no muslim problem ,and in fact the whole thing is overblown rhetoric fostered by the right wing press I am damn glad the “muslim problem”is being taken seriously.Most terrorists are Muslim though most muslims are not terrorist is an oft hear saying.As we are now wondering if the catholic priesthood is having a problem with pedophilia let us also wonder if the Muslim faith is not having a problem with growing killers.

King, himself was aid to Roy Cone, so he knows what he is doing. Just as “Tail Gunner” Joe did. He has a preconceived idea and is going to carry it through to the conclusion already drawn before hand. Kangaroos have nothing on his “court.”

Actually, most of the 80 non-muslim terror plots were not government-inspired, but were authentic and right-wing in origin, frequently carried out by self-described Christians, begging the questions as to whether King should be investigating the radicalization of the right and of Christians in general, if he is truly interested in more than just demonizing and scapegoating.

Well stats aside that seem to prove we have no muslim problem ,and in fact the whole thing is overblown rhetoric fostered by the right wing press I am damn glad the “muslim problem”is being taken seriously.Most terrorists are Muslim though most muslims are not terrorist is an oft hear saying
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So regardless of the evidence that there is, in fact, no problem, you’re gald that the problem is being addressed? Why bother with investigating at all, if you’re just gonna disbelieve evidence?

I, for one, am pressing Congress to address the problem of polar bears in Miami. There’s no evidence of such a problem, but I believe it so…

John i never said there was no problem.911 proved their is. Intelligence reports indicating embedded terrorists are pretty scary.Huge marches by Calipso Louie and his hateful rhetoric is sobering.And lets face it..the experience of France ,England,Germany and other emigrated muslim heavy countries is not promising.They have found this community to be a group that does not blend well into the melting pot.And the idea of sharia law is anthem.Worldwide there is a real problem with terrorism and Islam.You simply can’t deny it.I have never understood the “lack”of muslim groups taking to the streets after 911 to form into huge million man marches protesting the radicalization of their religion.You say ignore intelligence estimates and a proactive approach.It is the same argument against airport profiling.I say remember 911

You wrote that stats seem to prove we have no muslim problem. You don’t want to accept the stats because there’s obviously a problem, as evidenced by 9/11. So if you’ve already concluded there’s a problem, and you can feel free to ignore any coutervailing evidence, then I gotta wonder: what is the point of investigating? Just declare it a problem– evidence be damned. Only problem with that is that it’d seem like a pointless witch hunt and… oh, wait. Now I get it.

9/11 ain’t exactly evidence of radicalization of muslims in the US. Nobody involved in it was radicalized in the US to my knowledge. Furthermore, it’s an individual case. My grandfather’s individual case of cancer is not persuasive evidence of cancer in his neighbourhood. Statistics would bear out that conclusion as specious. But if you’re free to ignore the statistics in the name of remembering 9/11, then anybody can conclude anything they want.

Also, if you’ll check the archives here, they are several examples of muslim groups condemning the 9/11 attacks and other atrocities carried out in the name of Islam. They didn’t get much media coverage. True there were no million-man marches, but there was a lot of condemnation. To dismiss the mainstream muslim reaction as “not angry/sad/whatever enough” is awfully arrogant and hypocritical: (1) who are we to tell others how to feel about things? and (2) we sure don’t seem to like it when we’re told we’re not sorry enough about slavery, or for our treatment of indigenous tribes, or for a number of other things.

John I hope they find that there is no problem at all.We shall see. But I think the worldwide attacks by radical Muslims warrants an investigation to see where we stand in all this. France seems paralyzed to address its massive muslim pop and the problems that are coming along with it.Spain…..Aside from Israel we seem to be target number one. Nothing wrong with a look see.
911 is an example of embedded agents. The level of radicalization in this country is somewhat a mystery. Hard to quantify. That is a primary reason for this.Obviously intelligence reports indicate a problem exists(this has been sighted as a prime reason) So what is wrong with being ahead of the curve. Understanding if a problem exists,and addressing it?Im sure that Muslims in this country are 100%behind this country and our allies. Allies like Israel.Israel?????Ok maybe not 100%. Maybe 50%.Or maybe 20%.Ok maybe it is only 5%.No no maybe 100%…THE OTHER WAY!Um maybe we better see that report